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| Thread: Neutrals - how to make them usefull for the player |  This thread is pages long: 1 2 · «PREV |
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alcibiades
Honorable
Undefeatable Hero
of Gold Dragons
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posted September 22, 2011 09:36 PM |
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Well perhaps it was just the stick-to-the-strategy-you-know effect that hit me then, but I think almost half of the units in Heroes 4 I never used, simply because I always ended up doing the same choices (and they worked).
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What will happen now?
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Fauch
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 22, 2011 10:12 PM |
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but I think about anything worked (except ogre magi perhaps, but they could have their use (with the martyr spell   )) though, level 1 / 2 units were mostly useless in end game 
I don't know why they didn't make syrens and sea monsters recruitable. their abilities would have made them worthy in your army.
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B0rsuk
Promising
Famous Hero
DooM prophet
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posted September 22, 2011 10:29 PM |
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Edited by B0rsuk at 06:25, 23 Sep 2011.
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No, seriously, do you fight Black Dragons with Cyclops, too ? Dragons speed 7 vs Cyclops speed 4, they are going to act first and you can't disable them with spells.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5um8QWWRvo RSA Animate - Smile or die
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Fauch
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 22, 2011 10:51 PM |
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and with genies? that doesn't mean they aren't overpowered
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vicheron
Known Hero
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posted September 23, 2011 01:35 AM |
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I think one way they could make neutrals more viable for player use is by increasing their growth based on game time. They could have low growth for the first two weeks, medium growth for weeks three and four, and max growth after the first month.
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B0rsuk
Promising
Famous Hero
DooM prophet
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posted September 23, 2011 06:24 AM |
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mike80d
Famous Hero
Map Maker
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posted September 23, 2011 07:08 AM |
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When I mentioned Homm4 I wasn't at all refering to the alternate creatures. The neutrals were most definitely creatures that you considered to add to your army, which is an aspect that I like. Not every creature in your army should automatically have to be from a castle dwelling.
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B0rsuk
Promising
Famous Hero
DooM prophet
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posted September 27, 2011 07:26 AM |
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Edited by B0rsuk at 07:28, 27 Sep 2011.
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You people probably don't remember, but Ghosts are interesting neutrals in Heroes 1-2. They are generally not available to the player, but they make awesome treasure guards due to their ability. Whatever they kill becomes a ghost. With fast speed, flying, and 6-10 damage, they kill low level units very easily. They kill 10 archers, the ghost stack gains 10 creatures. They have a tendency to grow exponentially.
My point - neutrals can serve their purpose even if player can't recruit them.
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u5um8QWWRvo RSA Animate - Smile or die
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Nelgirith
Promising
Supreme Hero
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posted September 27, 2011 08:16 AM |
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Quote:
My point - neutrals can serve their purpose even if player can't recruit them.
Yeah sure, a creature that might appear once every blue moon on a map can serve its purpose. Bosses in H6 will play that role, no need for more elusive neutrals.
As Mike80D said, what makes neutrals interesting is not only when you have to fight them but also when you can mix them to your army. They don't need to have a dwelling that produces creatures every week, but the same way genies worked in H1/H2 (once you recruited the few ones that were in the lamp, it disappeared) or they could simply put the Refugee Camp back in game or even the Elemental Conflux (random elementals every week).
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Dave_Jame
Promising
Legendary Hero
I'm Faceless, not Brainless.
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posted September 27, 2011 08:48 AM |
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Yes Ghosts in Heroes II were an interestig option, and enemy. (In Heroes I there created ghosts did not stay in the game) but you can't give all the neutral such skill. Overpowerd Neutrals like the Ghost(H2) the 4 dragons (H3) and the expansion creatures (H4)are interesting for there strenght, and this makes them usefull in combat, and so an interesting option for the player. But there should be other ways to do that.
For example a Rogue (Clasical neutral from H 1-3)does not have to have to be the strogest neutral, but combined with his "Vision" skill In heroes 3 and 1,25 the number of an avarage castel creature growth (In fully constructed town), he would not have to be strongest "Core" creature, but still a realistic option. A Rogue, if humon, cloud also benefite from the Heaven guardian angel for example. Another step to make them more walueable
Other neutrals cloud be interesting because of there abilities. Like alcibiades said Enchaters form H3 or Wolves and Mantichoras in H5. These unites would finde there way into a line-up even if they were as numerus as a common faction unite (in a fully costucted town).
These are the options
But still the two basic problems are
1: Make neutrals (some of them) easy to recruit (give them dwllings, one or more on a map)
2: Make there numbers be comparavel to the faction unites (give them a higher growth rate)
Now that I think of it, The Problem of H3 and 5 is that thay have these "Creature boosting strctures. H2 had only two. The well (addet 2 to all creatures growth) and basic creature booster. this made the diference in numbers less critical
Edit:
The Lamp optin as Nelgirith pointed out couldwork well for the Pheonix in H5. Or to be precise anyfuture game where "Neutrals" is not a place to dump unused models and ideas that will be in teh game "because there we didi the already so why delete them"
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I'm just a Mirror of your self.
We see, we look, we gather, we store, we teach.
We are many, and you can be one of us.
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VokialBG
Honorable
Legendary Hero
First in line
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posted September 28, 2011 04:25 PM |
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I think neutrals need to be very strong cratures. Its because they live alone and they may face attacks from every kingdom around. They don't have sides and etc.
About neutrals I had this idea in the past:
http://heroescommunity.com/viewthread.php3?TID=20336
I actually think it's going to work very, very good with this area of effects thing added in heroes 6. The forts you need to chapter may actually work as a coloony in this my old idea... Look it, if you like, it may be used 
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Fauch
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 28, 2011 05:15 PM |
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Quote:
week, but the same way genies worked in H1/H2 (once you recruited the few ones that were in the lamp, it disappeared) or they could simply put the Refugee Camp back in game or even the Elemental Conflux (random elementals every week).
but in the case of ghosts, being able to recruit just 1 of them could be decisive. with genies it's something else, you have very few of them and have to sacrify one of 5 slots to get them into your army, and if they fail at activating their special, you basically just wasted a slot. it's probably harder to go wrong with ghosts.
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polaris
Promising
Known Hero
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posted September 28, 2011 09:16 PM |
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I think people are jumping the gun on this topic. I see a lot of discussion on how to make neutrals more important or easier to use, but I don't see anybody discussing why neutrals should be made more important or easy to use.
Call me old-fashioned, but I say any tweaks to an existing structure should be grounded in a specific purpose, and not just be done for the sake of tweaking.
The most obvious benefit I can think of is that neutrals increase play variety. Thinking it over carefully, though, it seems to me that making neutrals more accessible to player compositions would actually have the opposite effect.
I challenge a thoughtful reader to figure out why.
If you have a better reason for shaking up neutral creatures I'd love to hear it. But it is inappropriate to make a change without a reason guiding that change. And the one thing I'm not seeing in this topic is reasons to make suggested changes.
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Fauch
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 28, 2011 09:33 PM |
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because you could just remove a low level stack from your army and put a neutral instead = easy choice?
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Elvin
Admirable
Omnipresent Hero
Endless Revival
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posted September 29, 2011 03:10 AM |
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Quote:
The most obvious benefit I can think of is that neutrals increase play variety. Thinking it over carefully, though, it seems to me that making neutrals more accessible to player compositions would actually have the opposite effect.
I think not. In H5 it gave me one of the most interesting and complicated final battles I have ever played, exactly because the neutrals I got had good synergy with my army. That doesn't happen every day but it changed everything for that one game and made me think outside the box.
Also having played some of fiur's maps with the modded mercenary camp near your town, I can say that it made my earlygame significantly more interesting most of the times. Or his abysmal map where you could capture the custom dwellings that produced new units, they were very hard to get due to garrisons that gave you casualties and very expensive but were also significantly powerful too. Not azure dragon powerful but their abilities offered you a lot more options.
Then there were some amazing games I had in H3 that were only possible with diplomacy. Yes diplomacy could also ruin games but it is not as abusable a skill anymore.
And with the concept of convertion, H6 gives little incentive to mix different armies anymore since you can amass your native army. But is that what we really want in every single game? The alternative is not having randomly composed armies in every game if that is what you fear, exactly because convertion is possible. Convertion also implies that mixing armies is only relevant early to midgame where you can still try interesting things against neutrals or against a rusher where the tactics used could get unpredictable.
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Fauch
Responsible
Undefeatable Hero
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posted September 29, 2011 09:25 AM |
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Edited by Fauch at 09:26, 29 Sep 2011.
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and conversion can be deactivated?
I remember finding a titan week one in a refugee camp in H3
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polaris
Promising
Known Hero
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posted October 02, 2011 09:16 AM |
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fuast: it was more of a rhetorical question but since you answered it, I'll go ahead and give you my thoughts.
Your reasoning is very close but just one step off. All you've indicated is that it makes an easy choice, not that it impacts play variety in any way.
If there's a good neutral unit that mixes with your faction, then you will try to use it whenever it is available. So in the cases where it is available, you essentially have 6 units in your faction + 1 neutral, instead of the normal 7. Assuming that neutral unit is useful for ANY other faction as well (and if it's not then I would argue that it should have been a faction unit in the first place) then that faction also has 6 units + THE SAME neutral. The more neutrals in the game that are worthwhile, the more times you're going to be facing the same units in every different matchup. It effectively reduces the size of the factions when the neutrals are good enough to replace their own unique things.
This is not to say that neutrals do not serve any purpose. It is just to say that neutrals should not be too common in games. Which is two very different statements!
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Quote:
The most obvious benefit I can think of is that neutrals increase play variety. Thinking it over carefully, though, it seems to me that making neutrals more accessible to player compositions would actually have the opposite effect.
I think not. In H5 it gave me one of the most interesting and complicated final battles I have ever played, exactly because the neutrals I got had good synergy with my army. That doesn't happen every day but it changed everything for that one game and made me think outside the box.
Also having played some of fiur's maps with the modded mercenary camp near your town, I can say that it made my earlygame significantly more interesting most of the times. Or his abysmal map where you could capture the custom dwellings that produced new units, they were very hard to get due to garrisons that gave you casualties and very expensive but were also significantly powerful too. Not azure dragon powerful but their abilities offered you a lot more options.
Then there were some amazing games I had in H3 that were only possible with diplomacy. Yes diplomacy could also ruin games but it is not as abusable a skill anymore.
Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe H5 was specifically mentioned as a game where adding neutrals to your army was difficult. H3 the neutrals you added were completely random which makes any specific neutral still rather inaccessible.
So the fact that they those cases add play variety rather reinforces my point rather than negate it. I'm saying that making neutrals accessible is what reduces play variety. Keeping them inaccessible is what makes it interesting, as you point out.
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polaris
Promising
Known Hero
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posted October 02, 2011 09:24 AM |
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Hmm, I can't edit my post. Sorry for mispelling your name "Fauch"
I would fix it but editting seems broken.
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agent_00_blerd
Adventuring Hero
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posted October 18, 2011 01:58 PM |
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Reminds me of one of the suggestions I made for H6. That instead of adding more factions (which all need to be tied down into the story, must have strong connections with the lore and such), they should introduce a relatively large number of good neutral creatures, for all tiers.
The main reason was a game of H3:WOG that I played with a slightly unusual Tower army:
My army included a few new neutrals introduced in WOG. The sorceress (ranged attacker with chance to inflict random curse), the santa gremlins (useless stats but summon a stack of gremlins/master gremlins around them in each battle which serve as great cannon fodder) and Gorynyches (flying hydras). This was my MAIN hero's army. Because of the leveling system in WOG, these troops became insanely powerful since most of them did ranged damage (and I had equipped several bonuses to that effect) plus two fast melee troops with no enemy retaliation (and multiple attacks due to the upgrades).
It was a very enjoyable experience and I think something like this, if properly supported, would immensely improve re-playability. Things like:
1. Allowing creature production upgrades to affect neutral dwellings under your control as well. This would remove the need to place multiple dwellings for the same creature.
2. Allowing neutrals to be recruited directly from your castle.
3. Making sure all neutral troops are good for SOMETHING. There were some troops in heroes 4 that were so far outclassed by the alternate that they were almost NEVER picked. None of those creatures please since it's easy to create a pathetic creature (read h4 peasant) and use it as a neutral just to increase the total number of creatures in the game. And nothing game breaking either like a dragon with 15 million hp that can breathe black holes.
4. Most neutrals should be associated to a particular faction. That way racial abilities would work on those too making them a viable alternative to your faction's stock creatures.
The way it would work in a map is that a map maker would place a "random tier X dwelling" near your starting position and have it linked to your faction type. Then when a game starts, it would randomly pick a particular neutral from that tier and you would have the option of including it in your army or just keeping it for castle defense (finally something to be given to secondary heroes).
So if you're lucky and the neutral that is randomly picked happens to fit your play style, you could include that in your army and give the extra creature stack to your secondary hero. If it's not the one you want, it would most likely still serve SOME role because of point number 3 mentioned above.
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